


In Which Everyone is a Hipster

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-01
Updated: 2011-07-04
Packaged: 2017-10-18 20:40:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/193082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Well, let's just say this. I'll give you a free pass for Egbert if you don't mind me bothering the c00lk1d."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In Which We Make First Contact

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys, if you could toss some feedback my way, I would really appreciate it. <3

"You hate the new guy," She said. It wasn't so much a question as an outright statement of fact. It would have been a strange thing for any other naked girl to say to the boyfriend whose couch she was lying on naked. Her bare feet were pressed against his chest, and her hands were resting above her head against the wall.

"Why the fuck would I hate the new guy? I've got enough fucking problems just dealing with your blind ass," He retorted, pulling her into an affectionate headlock, his knuckles rubbing against her scalp in the sweetest of noogies. She screeched in laughter, wriggling in his grasp and gnawing against his arm. With a hiss of pain he dropped her, and she pounced back on him, straddling his waist and pinning his shoulders down.

"You hate the new guy because you can't piss him off," She said, running her dark grey tongue up the side of his face, making him blush that mutant red, "And I don't mind that you hate him," Terezi continued, leaning back and running her hands through her hair, squealing when Karkat squeezed her breasts in retaliation.

"You're a fucking loony, you know that?" He said, rolling his eyes as she mock slapped him with one hand, and reached across him to grab her bra with the other.

"Well, let's just say this. I'll give you a free pass for Egbert if you don't mind me bothering the coolk1d." She beamed at him through her red glasses, sliding the straps up over her shoulders and latching it behind her. He grunted, his face so red and cherry flavored that she couldn't help but suck against the apples of his cheeks for at least another couple of minutes.  
Unequivocally a yes.

\---

Your name is John Egbert. It is a few weeks earlier, but you don't know earlier than what. You recently transferred to Liberal Arts University from State University to continue your photography major with better resources. Your interests are Nicolas Cage, photographing things in industrial parks, and mostly girls. You're still not sure on that last one.

>Go back to third person narrative

It was a party, celebrating the start of a new semester. There was a cooler of Pabst, several Polaroid camera going around, and some sick music playing in the background. He was so excited, he was hyper, jumping from group to group, introducing himself to anyone who's attention he could still for a few minutes at the time. It was perhaps a grievous miscalculation on his part when he interceded into what a normal person would have considered a fight.

There were a lot more troll students at this school, which was different but still cool. They had quadrants and stuff, and it was pretty easy to get one of them to hate you on accident, but in their culture that wasn't necessarily a bad thing? Boy, they sure were strange. Following that trend, there were a lot of Trolls at this particular party, again, not a problem because they were all pretty cool. Well.

These two looked like cool guys. Sure, the taller one's glasses lenses didn't match, but that was probably on purpose, and the other guy looked constipated, but it was a party, right?!

"Hi! My name is John, I just transfered-"

"How quaint," The glassed one said, taking a sip from his cheap beer, "Doeth thith mean you're introduthing yourthelf?"

It was very hard not to laugh at his lisp, but it was probably also very impolite to. So, his mouth opened into a large smile, while his hand covered it in case a giggle would leak out.

"The fuck is wrong with you?" The second, angry looking one asked, his arms crossed over his chest and his eyebrows crossing his face, "Don't you have some human friends to go bother, or do you just like to fucking pester other trolls for some sick racist kick?"

"Ha ha, no," John said, taking it as a joke and shaking his head, his straw hat bouncing off his head as he did so, "I just don't know either of you yet, so I thought I would come... get to-"

"Oh, GOG, I do not have the words. There are not any words for how dumb that sounds. I could have every word every uttered and it would still sound dumber than I could ever possible describe."

"Thtop being an ath," The one with a lisp said, punching his companion in the shoulder, "Iths a wonder you have a matethprit at all."

"...What're your names?" There was something in the hopefull beam in his face that made Karkat's gut twist into deep, loathing knots. He fumed for a minute, trying to pinpoint what exactly this guy was doing to make him so utterly angry.

"Thollux, and thith athhole is Karkat. Thay hello, Karkat."

"Fuck off."

"Oh, well, I'm John, still, I said that, and uhm. I think I want to go eat some chips," He grinned, tilting his head and nodding in confimation.

"You do that," Sollux said, nodding his head in approval, feeling like this kid wanted him to do so for some reason.

"Gog, you're probably going to go fucking eat all of them. Go on, run back to the human side of the party, can't be seen hanging out with fucking lowlife trolls like us, can you? Fucking terrible isn't?" Karkat waved him off, shifting his sockless feet in his keds.

"I'll see you around!"

>Investigate the snack table

"Theriously, hide that hate boner. Your embarathing me," Sollux said, giving his quietly raging companion the side eye. Karkat hated everyone. He used hate like some people used ketchup, smearing it over everything to hide the actual flavor. This was not ketchup, it was a legitimate tomato, and Karkat didn't know what to do with it. It was kind of funny.

"You shut the fuck up!" Was the immediate response, his arms throwing up in the air, "Just met the fucking guy, he just seems like a dick, I'm not going black after seeing someone for the first time. It's not some fucking movie, it's not some sign of a happy future, I'll probably never talk to that asshole again so get off my motherfucking case and go back to kissing princess's glubbing feet."

"You're bthuthing," Sollux pointed out.

"What did you even just say? What words did you try to pronounce with your stupid goddamn lisp? You sound like someone hit you in the face with a bat- OH, right, that's just how the mother grub showed she hates you. Shitty yellow blood and shitty yellow teeth to go with it. WHY ARE YOU LAUGHING? STOP LAUGHING, I AM INSULTING YOU."


	2. Meeting People

You are Karkat Vantas. You're sitting in the lecture hall where your Art History 100 class is going to start in fifteen minutes, and because you're shit at scheduling classes, it's currently 7:15 and none of your friends are in this session. You have a LARGE COFFEE drink with too much goddamn sugar in it because the dipshit behind the counter doesn't know what he's fucking doing, and a HUSKTOP primed and ready to take notes. You're wearing SHORTS, which you now regret because the nook sucking maintenance crew has turned the air conditioning up to fucking polar caps levels. The seat beside you is empty.

>Shit lets be the narrator

"Oh! Hey, I know you!" Karkat freezes, a cold splash of horror hitting his system. He turns his head slowly, mouth hanging open, the straw just inches away from his lips, "We met at the party, remember? You're name's Karkat, right?" The human boy slides into the empty seat, Karkat's buffer seat. He takes out a notebook, with a picture of Bill Cosby printed on the cover, and he flips to the first page. He is wearing overall shorts. _It's that guy_. For a few minutes he can just stare in mute rage and horror as the human digs in his stupid bag for a pen, and just grins at him like he expects something.

"Go. Away." He says very carefully, realizing that an acoustic lecture hall is not the place to explode into rant about all the things wrong with this human right now. He pouts, sticking his bottom lip out and shifting in his seat.

"Is that flavored coffee?" John asks, having been distracted, "I usually get chocolate, but the shop on campus is really expensive. Do you live on campus? I have to because it's my first year-"

"What in the bulgesucking world are you talking about? Why are you telling me these things?" Karkat was completely and utterly baffled by the sheer lack of restraint 'John' possessed. Had someone broken his 'don't talk to strangers' button, or was he just born without one? "No, it's just iced. Flavored coffee is for sissy little grubs who can't take the real stuff."

"Oooohh. Grubs are troll babies, right?"

"What? How do you not- Gog, you must be more of a complete idiot than I had taken you for. How did you even get into this school? Are you somebody's son? Did your little human lusus pay lots of money to get you into here?"

"Uhm, all humans are somebody's son... Unless they're a girl, then they're called daughters..." John started, his brow furrowing as he tried to think of how to explain this, suddenly overcome with an urge of CULTURAL BRIDGE BUILDING.

"No. You stop right there. You stop that train of thought. We are not having this discussion. We are not talking about different young rearing techniques and you are not going to sit there the entire rest of class, so get your pink-skinned ass out of that seat so that I can learn in isolation from all of your stupid."

"...The rest of the class is full..." John said, feigning apologeticness so well that if Karkat wasn't so sure of what a giant ass this guy was, he could take it for genuine. While the two of them had this 'discussion,' more students had filled into the hall until _every other nooksucking seat was taken._ Karkat was quite ready to fling a freshman out of a seat far away from his own to solve this problem, but the last thing he needed was to be on behavioral probation, "Sorry, maybe if I get to class earlier tomorrow-"

"Just. Fuck. Fucking- Look. You sit there, you take notes, you don't talk to me. I'll sit here, I'll take notes, and I won't talk to you," He said with resolute finality, turning to open Troll Word to prepare for class.

"Okay. So. Are we friends?" John asked after a moment, "We could get lunch after class-"

"What? Why are you even asking that? No, look- I told you not to talk to me!" He turned to glare at him, his brows knitting when the human just smiled back. He was writing something on his notebook, and Karkat made the poor decision of looking.

It said:

 _We should go get tacos. Or something. I mean, anything but cake, but cake for lunch would be weird anyway. I mean, we could eat on campus, but I don't really like the cafeteria and-_

  
"NO. No. Just- Fuck, look, class is starting. Note taking time. Take notes." Karkat pointed straight ahead of them to the professor who was setting up at the podium, "He is going to talk now, and you're going to write down what he says. No talking to me. No writing little notes to me. Can you understand that? Can your tiny little rice grain brain understand what I am saying?"

John just laughed, "Okay, Karkat, I know what to do in class." There was something about the kid's smile that just made his hackles rise. It was both goofy and confident, unbearably genuine and at the same time innocent enough to make you almost feel _guilty_ for being such a bad person your whole life. His glasses magnified his eyes and made his nose look slightly larger than normal, giving him a strange, square-eyed bug effect. _It was pissing him off so badly_.

Then, the lecture started.

>Take notes.

You are still the narrator. You guess you could take notes, but that's what you've been doing this whole time.

>Move to another scene.

The only reason Terezi Pyrope is at this school is the decent liberal arts program. Not a terrible basis for getting into law school, and they practically tripped over themselves trying to throw scholarship money at the blind kid. She happily took every penny.That, and she could take any art class she wanted and bowl everyone over with her talent. She figured she was just like that girl from that Lionel Richie video. H3LLLLLOOOOO, 1S 1T M3 YOU'R3 LOOOK1NG FOOOORRR~

>Enough Rambling.

Truth be told, she does have a pretty good, uh, tongue for art. Mostly she's just bullshitting everybody, but the professors eat it up, she gets a 4.0, and everybody is happy.

Then she meets the COOLK1D.

>Be the Troll Girl

>Meet the COOlK1D

 


	3. Meet The Coolk1d

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "The mouth looks like a fucking pork chop," He says with all the expression of a particularly expressionless stone.

You are used to being called a g3n1us. Actually, it has gotten to the point that when you don't get enough compliments, you almost feel insulted. You act like it, anyway. This whole thing is a sham, really, your entire career as an artist, your double major in the visual arts, is one giant joke that no one at the college has really caught onto yet. Really, all it does is make it that much funnier.

Besides, who would _dare_ insult a blind girl?

It is the beginning of the quarter gallery show, and naturally you have a few canvasses hanging. You can smell that two of them are upside down, but really you could care less. Those two were landscapes, and it can be confusing to tell ground from sky when one is red and the other is yellow. The portraits are about right, you suppose. Naturally, you've been stalking around the gallery, pouncing on freshmen and asking them just what they think of your work, looking for their quickly hashed together theories. You can smell the deceit and fear on everyone of them, and it gives you a nice laugh.

There is a new guy, though. You can tell he is new because he smells like vanilla. You have heard about pigmentless humans before, albinos, but it never really meant much. They were all colored differently anyway, why would this one be any different? It was like there was a person shaped hole in your perception of the world, only partially covered in plaid and blue jean.

Naturally, you _have_ to bother him. You approach carefully, like a predator. Wine glass in one hand, cane in the other, you duck behind crowds of students there as a class requirement, and other assholes who are just mooching off the free snacks and booze. You feel proud of your own ninja skills, slipping beside the human, who almost instantly turns his head. You smell one of his brows quirking, and he points towards your self-portrait.

"The mouth looks like a fucking pork chop," He says with all the expression of a particularly expressionless stone. This stops you in your tracks, freezing your normal manic expression on your face. As you get closer you realize he smells like artificial cherries- a symptom of electronic cigarettes. Or cough drops, really, but he doesn't smell sick.

 "W...WH4t?" You ask, perfectly calmly, sipping the cheap gallery wine and leaning against your walking stick, head tilting pleasantly away from him, a perfect tell that he was insulting a blind troll. Though. You give him the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps he doesn't realize this is your work. Maybe he just thinks you are a particularly ironic hipster- Blind girl in a visual art gallery, hilarious. Blind girl posing for visual art, doubly ironic. You suck in the air as you lean forward, tasting his atmosphere. There is music on him, likely his major.

"The eyes aren't even on your face. It's fucking hidious," He added, inhaling from his water based nicotine dispensing system, then blowing the artificial smoke to the side, away from yourself and your art. You appreciate the gesture, but you move so that you are directly in his line of sight.

"So you th1nk you are som3 4wesome 4rt guy?" You asked, laughing to yourself as your slight accent slips in, emphasis falling on vowels seemingly at random, "1f you l1ke it so much... they're 4ll for s4le," you offer, tapping your cane at the tiny plaque under this particular canvas, which is currently displaying an eye bleedingly large number, "Or w3 could work out som3 oth3r k1nd of tr4de-" He is unphased by all of your teasing, you can tell. Calling him out, insulting him- You want to make him uncomfortable, to make him squirm for getting so close to calling you out, to insulting your _work_. That, or laugh along with him. You're not sure where all this _dangerously close_ to flushed banter is coming from. Maybe it is the giant human genetic material producing orbs this human is  currently displaying talking to you like this, while smoking his play pretend little cigarette in the school gallery. Those are supposed to be attractive on humans, right?

"I really think I need to fucking own this beautiful insult to all of art kind, right this minute," He says, which actually surprises you as he tucks the cancerstick behind his ear, his hand running down through his hair, messing it up just enough that it seems like it was done on purpose. You briefly wonder if there is a significance to that, and it probably is more effective on a seeing person. It is hard to smell all the different locations of several strands of hair, "Look. Let me lay it on the line for you. I will drop down uncountable fat beats about your clashing color schemes and total ignorance or lack of concern for basic design principals or whatever other subject you want to hear fat beats about, if you draw me like you did this sick version of yourself. I am just so overwhelmed by this, I need to be a part of it. This is greater than me and anything I can ever create. Can you make this happen?"

Your brows rise at the sincerity in that statement. It sounds like sincerity, and it only smells slightly of deceit. It burns with only the smallest bouquet of sarcasm beneath the sweet oleander of his complexion and unchanging facial expression. Your following laughter was unavoidable, "Oh, who sent suck a coolk1d an 1nv1t4t1on to this opening? I only draw my models _compl3t3ly_ _1n the nud3_ , though, coolk1d. Do you have a n4me, coolk1d?"

"Ben Stiller. Now are you going to draw my massive tower of sausage in all its glory, or are you going to do some tasteful Greek nude? I only pose for the trashiest and dirtiest of naked art. I  cannot have propriety and censorship get in the way of the sanctity of my giant pink spiced ham stick," He responds, his hands sliding into his pockets as he slouches, making eye contact with you through both of your glasses. Reflexively you laugh, stepping forward and hissing in the spirit of the game.

"You 4re b31ng a g14nt liar right now, B3n. I can taste your deceit like the after burn of a particularly nasty d13t sod4. 4r3 you a deceit sod4, B3n?" There is no pause in your speech, and you continue, leaning just ever so slightly to one of his round human ears, noticing as you get closer the familiar tang on your nose of a plastic gauge, a piercing, "4nd I 4ssur3 you I h4ve a taste for human h4m stick,"

"The real name is Dave," he replies in step with you producing a business card from somewhere within his pockets. There is a phone number, a website, and his full name in comic sans in a font so small you have to lick the card to detect it, "The number on there works sometimes. Or I just don't answer it. I really don't give a shit most of the time. Let me know when you want me to model for your masterpiece," the corners of his lips twitch slightly, and you're not sure what that means, but he puts his hands up in some kind of wave.

 **> Watch the coolk1d leave.**

Your name is still Terezi Pyrope. Before this gallery show, you were content with a Matesprit and a few possible Kismesis. Now you're not sure what is going on.

Fucking quadrants, how do they work?


	4. >Be Someone Else

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It is hard getting close to someone so soon after going through the hell that was your last morialship.

Your name is Feferi Peixes, and you work at an animal shelter. You also volunteer at the nursing home, the local homeless shelter, and a soup kitchen. During the summer you have a part time job as a life guard at the local water park. You live your life so selflessly you make other people feel like shit just by talking about what you did over the weekend. You are genuinely a good person through and through, with the exception of your low tolerance for idiocy. You are in school to eventually get your PhD in psychology. You finally got the nerve up  to end your morialship with Eridan.

Your friends had been worried about you. You hadn't been as ---EXCIT---ED as you usually were, you had spent less time doing what you loved and instead doing what he wanted. It all came to a head when Jade caught you crying in the bathroom at school, after he had, again, told you that you were pretty much useless to him if you weren't fucking him.

You are doing much better since you severed ties.

You are moving on with your life, spending more time doing what you love. Nepeta is happy that you can come work with her at the animal shelter more, and the homeless shelter could always use another hand. Your grades are improving, and you've started meeting new people. Things have really been looking up lately.

Except, your husktop has just died. It is late at night on a Wednesday, and though you don't have class until the afternoon, the essay you were writing for that class is due tomorrow, and you have yet to print it or transfer it to a data storage stick, or as Eridan would have insisted you say it, jump-drive. While you have several pals who are pretty decent with computers, there is ON-E PAL IN PARTICULAR that you would like to talk to most.

It is hard getting close to someone so soon after going through the hell that was your last morialship. But you like the way he treats you, like a normal troll being, and you like the way you can almost make him smile.

You send him a R-ESTRAIN-ED text detailing your computer problems and their seriousness, as well as a P--ERF-ECTLY L-EV-EL )(-EAD-ED request for tips on fixing them.

You are mildly surprised when he almost instantly responds.

 **> Be The Nerd**

You are at a party. You go to them fairly often, considering that most people would assume you are a shut in. You like good dubstep, good techno, and good house music, and while they don't play any of that here, it's alright for MAiiN2TREAM BULL2HiiT. You were just about to ditch this place to go back to your rental hive to play some Minecraft, when your phone vibrates. You are used to Karkat bothering you at all hours of the day, and it is about the time that Eridan would send his bi-weekly drunk text telling you how much he hates you and how bad he wants your bulge, but you have both of them set to 'block' right now.

You don't get many other texts.

 **cC:** )(-Ey! I need to ask a really big favor.

 **cC:** My comput-Er won't turn back on, and I )(ave an ----Essay du----E!!!!

 **cC:** )(--ELP!!! Please. If you're not busy, I mean.

You would slit someone's throat if they told her this, but there is not a whole lot you could be busy with that you wouldn't drop to help her out. She's one of the only assholes out there that are actually fucking grateful when you fix their technological horror stories. She is also one of the few losers who actually take care of their laptops; no food, no liquids, no dents in the case, no cracks or scratches on the screen, and only a few stupid stickers stuck to the lid. That, and she saved your life that one time.

You owe her in more ways that you'd like to admit, and you like her a little more redly than you'd care someone to find out about.

 **tA:** diid you plug iit iin?

 **cC:** Y-es. It buzz-Es?

 **tA:** ii2 iit over heated?  

 **cC:**...Not really?!

You really don't want to be the one to tell her this might be a serious problem. You wish you could just call her a dunkass and tell her to plug the damn thing in, and it would just magically start back up, but you figure it's a more serious problem. The thing was over two sweep, five years old. The music from the actual party is starting to make your head throb, and you can barely read his screen in the black light.

 **tA:** hold on ii'm goiing out2iide

With your hands over your ears and above the crowd you push through the throbbing, pulsing house party, out the front door and between a set of bored smokers on the porch, until you came to your automatic carriage. You had fixed it up yourself, buying the RUSTED HUNK OF SHIT from a used car place and refining it back into the MOVING RUSTED HUNK OF SHIT THAT IS ALSO BLUE that it now was. You weren't quite good to drive yet, but you would  be fine by the time you worked out problem.

 **tA:** ii2 the hiinge 2tiil fiine?

 **cC:** Yea... I don't t)(ink wir-Es ar-E loos-E...I tri-Ed to updat-Ed my bios?

You sigh.

She probably lost every piece of data on her computer, but it was definitely fixable. She probably had it all backed up somewhere, meticulous as she was, and you were sure, that somehow, you could find a way to get her data back to her. It might take a week, but you could.

 **tA:** there ii2 your fuckiing problem. do you not know anythiing about computer2? no 2hit, that's what fucked up your 2y2tem.

 **tA:** iit2 almo2t liike talkiing two kanaya. at lea2t you know you diid 2omethiing 2tupiid

 **tA:** ii'll have two fuckiing look at iit. ju2t make your fuckiing pathetiic dolphiin eye2 and the proffe22or'll probably giive you an exten2iion

 **tA:** there isn't a fucker alive who can resist that pitiful shit

 

Oh fuck you hit enter. You actually hit enter. You stare at your phone for a minute, and your head swims, because you didn't think you had had that much to drink tonight. There it is, the jig is up, she knows you're about as flushed as a pantsed school boy and now she's going to freak the fuck out and go hide in her recoopercoon. You know she just got out of a bad situation, and you know she just wants to b-E fri-Ends and now the cat is out of the proverbial bag. No, the cat set the bag on fire like a jail  escapee and is tearing through your house, slashing your drapes and there is absolutely nothing you can do about it.

 **cC:** Oh. Oh! okay! That mig)( work!!

 **cC:** T)(ANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!!

 **cC:** We s)(ould, u)(, meet up? Tomorrow? So you can fix it?

 **tA:** yea sure

You are apathetic. Nothing matters anymore. You hope to gog she just happened to be so worried about her husktop that she didn't notice, but you'll settle for her just being polite and pretending.

 **cC:** Well I should go to bed. It is SO LAT-E.

You check your watch. It is 12:15 PM. ****

 **cC:** I'll text you after class?!

 **tA:** yea

 **cC:** Okay. It is a PLAN!!!  

 **cC:** Good niig)(t Sollux!!!  <3

You stare at your phone for a little while, a lump in your throat. You feel like a glubbing wriggler and you're not sure what to do about it. You save this conversation in a special folder, and you pop off a message to Karkat, who has sent you no fewer than 5 messages while you were conversing with Feferi, all of which were blaming you for giving the John kid his phone number.

Karkat is a really good guesser.

 

 

 

 


End file.
